


All Seem to Say, Throw Cares Away

by Maidenjedi



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, canon violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-28 16:46:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/309934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maidenjedi/pseuds/Maidenjedi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A few unseen Christmases for Mulder and Scully.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All Seem to Say, Throw Cares Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lone_lilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lone_lilly/gifts).



> Written for onlylonelilly in 2011 XF Santa. Title, and subtitles, from the lyrics to "The Carol of the Bells." Approximate timeline taken from Timeline Universe here: http://timelineuniverse.net/X-Files/X-FilesChronology.htm. Rated "Mature" for references to canon violence.

\- bringing good cheer -

It wasn't often, growing up on coastal Naval bases, that the Scully kids got to throw snowballs and build snowmen and wear snowsuits and boots to trudge through fresh drifts on the way to school.

So it made sense that Dana Scully would feel especially bitter about spending this particular snowstorm tracking a snow monster - what her partner _assumed_ was a snow monster, there was no empirical evidence of anything supernatural and there never was. In North Dakota, of all places.

"Of all god-forsaken places," she mumbled, and Mulder didn't hear her, because he was driving and humming along to the radio, which worked just fine even if the heater did not.

When they reached Fargo, they pulled into a dumpy motel and were sent away ("Full up," said the clerk, as though a convention were taking place). So they went to a dumpier place and were given one key, to one room, with one bed, and the clerk's bubbly, knowing wink and grin.

The room smelled like wet snow and pine-scented cleaner, and the bed was clean if it wasn't very big. The television got exactly two stations - the local news affiliate and what appeared to be local access, playing a bad copy of _It's a Wonderful Life_ on what would turn out to be endless loop.

Mulder claimed the bathroom before Scully could disentangle herself from her two scarves and puffy winter coat. She looked out the window at the piling snow drift that already covered their car's tires. At this rate, they wouldn't leave Fargo until the new year, and she would miss Christmas with her new sister-in-law and Bill would complain and lecture her for it.

Mulder came out of the bathroom and waved toward it. "Your turn, Scully." The first words he'd said since she'd gone off on a bit of a tirade about being dragged out to blizzard country when they landed in Minneapolis.

Scully grabbed her bag and went into the tiny bathroom, and took her time changing into dry, warm clothes and soaking her feet for a few minutes in hot (well, lukewarm) water. She emerged feeling much more human, and certainly more willing to listen to her partner's crazy theories.

He was sitting on the bed, and the television was heralding the start of _It's a Wonderful Life_ for what was probably the tenth or eleventh time (maybe more). In his hand, Mulder had a badly-wrapped gift, in the shape of a book or flat box.

"I don't really do Christmas, Scully. I'm Jewish."

She didn't know that about him. "Okay."

"But I know you do, and I know you're far away from everything and I know you think my theory on this case is shit."

She thought most of his theories were shit. Last time, it had been killer ladybugs in southern Alabama. That was what, a week ago? Two? But she held her tongue.

"But I did get you something. Here." He held out the gift as if it were a shield.

She opened it, revealing a slim book about road trips in the Pacific Northwest. There was a sticker on the front that read "Don't miss Bellefleur, Oregon, the Alien Capitol of the Northwest!"

She laughed, and kept laughing as she looked up at Mulder, whose ordinarily mischievous gaze had intensified, and who was grinning widely.

"They're serious about that, aren't they?" she said, still giggling.

"Oh, I hear there's going to be a museum, too."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Where our hotel room was."

And she laughed even harder, falling a little on the bed, and on television young George Bailey was wishing for a million dollars. "Hot dog!" he exclaimed as the lighter ignited.

Mulder and Scully found no trace of a snow monster in Fargo, and Mulder had to sleep on the floor, but that first Christmas together, they found something like common ground.

 

\- o how they pound -

Even though Christmas was a week away, she had not put up a Christmas tree.

Any other year, any other apartment. Not this place. She was here to clean, and then pack, and move out. Not celebrate. She hadn't been back here since returning from the hospital - she'd been staying with her mother, being petted and loved and spoiled while she recovered more fully from...what had happened. Today she had decided it was time to do inventory and get ready to move, and she'd come alone, insistent that she needed the space.

There was still blood, on the table. Where she'd hit her hand after attempting to fend off Duane Barry.

She had really hoped someone, her mother or Melissa or the cops, _someone_ , would have cleaned the place. But then again, they all thought she'd be back so soon, they touched nothing, and the blood was in a place no one would have seen it. Not her mother, who would have gone into the bedroom and only there, nor Melissa, who had an eye for detail in everything except mundane places like living rooms.

Scully went into the kitchen to get the cleaner and a washrag. As she was coming out, there was a knock at the door, and she dropped the bottle and the rag and reached for her gun at her waistband.

Of course, there was no gun at her waistband, as she was not yet back on full duty.

"What do you want?" She hated the plaintive note, the weakness in her voice. The little girl in her shook violently. So did the grown woman, truth be told.

"Scully? It's Mulder."

It's Mulder. Of course. He knocked. Intruders don't knock, Duane Barry didn't fucking _knock_. Scully took a deep breath, and another, and walked to the door. "Is it really you?"

Why did she feel she had to ask? She hated this.

"Do you remember that night in Bellefleur? The spots on your back?"

Mulder was the only one who ever knew about that. It wasn't even in her official report on file with the Bureau.

She opened the door, leaving the chain lock up while she looked out, since she was too short in sneakers to see out the peephole. There was Mulder, in a Yale t-shirt and his black leather jacket.

They both wished they hadn't heard her sigh of relief, and she let him in. In his hand was a grocery bag, which he gave to her. "Thought you might need some of this."

In the bag was a can of Comet, two sponges, and a small bottle of Jack Daniels with a Christmas ribbon around the neck.

Scully laughed, the sound so odd on her lips that she almost stopped, until she saw the look on Mulder's face. His eyes were soft, but he was grinning, and he looked like someone who had discovered joy.

She let her laugh linger, then she threw her free arm up around his neck and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. "Thank you. This is exactly what I wanted for Christmas."

Mulder helped her clean the apartment, and he lifted more boxes than was strictly required as a coworker even if you had faced liver-eating mutants together. And when they were done, they toasted each other with Jack on the rocks in styrofoam cups Scully hadn't known she had.

 

\- gaily they ring -

It was not a date, because you don't date coworkers and you especially don't date your partner at the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

That's how Mulder and Scully justified all the dinners out they started having sometime after finally dispatching Donnie Pfaster. Not that they made the connection, out loud or even to themselves. But Scully had escaped yet another brush with brutality, and Mulder was healthy, really healthy, for the first time in practically years, so they were celebrating. They kept telling themselves, they deserved it.

It was Christmas Eve, and Scully had just that morning returned from visiting the grave. She always did, this time of year, and she took white daisies when she went. They never talked about it. Not whose grave it was, not whether there was anyone to actually visit within it. Mulder did not go with her, because she didn't ask but also because it wasn't his pilgrimage to make.

He had his own demons, after all.

Scully had made him swear, this year there would be no wacky haunted house adventure, and that if he wanted to spend time with her, he would do it properly. So Scully made Christmas day plans with her family (Charlie was supposed to make it this year, he promised a dozen times) and Mulder planned something for Christmas Eve. Casual, dinner, nothing special because it was not a date and after all, they were not dating.

It was mediocre Italian with excellent wine. So excellent they bought a bottle, and toasted their successes of the last year. What few there were, at any rate. Scully was not talking about Africa and Mulder didn't speak of all that happened to cause her to go there in the first place. Instead they celebrated having the X-Files back for what appeared to be the foreseeable future, and laughed over what happened in Arcadia. Mulder promised to take Scully to a Yankee game, so she could get really get it, and she agreed, promising not to tell her brother the Red Sox fan about it the next day, because one Scully male hating her partner was plenty.

They were not out late, not by their standards. There was still traffic on the road. Scully was more sober than Mulder and so she drove, planning to take a cab back to her place since it was his car.

"Before you ask, Mulder, my little feet can indeed reach these pedals," she said as she climbed in over his weak protests.

He laughed. "If you say so."

They made it back to Alexandria while the night was yet young. It was not quite Christmas.

"I didn't get you anything this year, Scully," he said as he unbuckled his seat belt.

"You're back, and for good. That's enough of a present anyway."

"Besides, I don't celebrate Christmas."

So he had said, for years, even while holding out green-and-red, bow-bedecked gift boxes.

"I'm going to come up and call a cab. Is that alright?"

"You coming up, or you leaving me alone on Christmas Eve?" She didn't notice the flirting tone, oh no.

They went inside, and Mulder stopped her outside the elevator and pointed up. Someone in the building had tried to make the place festive and put up a pinecone meant to be mistletoe on the ceiling. "Look, mistletoe."

Scully laughed. "That's not mistletoe, Mulder." She leaned over to push the "up" button. He caught her hand.

"It could be."

She scowled a little. It had been a fun night, but....

"Use your imagination, Dr. Scully."

And he leaned down to kiss her as the elevator door opened, and she would have to push the button twice more before they were able to make it upstairs.

**Author's Note:**

> More A/N: I really believe they kissed before the events of "Millennium." :-)


End file.
